The Rally Poland was marked by pursuit drives for the Škoda crews. And those that led to a successful end. After a troubled first day, the Oliver Solberg/Elliott Edmondson crew climbed to the final second position and at the very end the Estonian duo Robert Vivers/Aleks Lesk successfully fought for third place.
Solberg entered the Rally Poland in a disadvantageous position. With the absence of Yohan Rossel and Jan Solans, who are currently in first and second place in the WRC2 championship, Solberg, who was third for the time being, was the first to start on the stages. As a “track cleaner”, he struggled mainly with loose gravel and was unable to get up to speed on the first day, which meant that he only finished seventh on Friday, 33.2 seconds behind leader Sami Pajari.
"It was an incredibly challenging day because we were the first WRC2 car on the track. I didn't expect to be so far down the rankings. We have a big gap," Solberg commented on the first leg. However, he certainly did not give up: "In the past, however, we have pulled off much bigger losses. We will do the same here," he said. And he acted on that statement on the track on Saturday. He accelerated significantly and managed to close in on the drivers in front of him, gradually climbing to second position.
However, he was also helped by the bad luck of some drivers. For example, the duo of Kajetan Kajetanowicz/Maciej Szczepaniak, who were in second place in the rally after the first day with their Škoda Fabia RS Rally2 special, had to retire on Saturday when they significantly damaged their car during a minor trip off the track. "We went out, hit something and broke the suspension. These things happen when you push the envelope," Kajetanowicz said.
With only four stages left on Sunday, one of which was the final Power Stage, it was pretty much clear that the fast Solberg was unlikely to be attacking the lead again, as he would have to be helped by his rival's bad luck with a loss of 26.3 seconds. It didn't happen, so he was 22 seconds behind the winner at the finish. "First of all, it's very important for the whole championship, even though I'm not happy at all. But the team did a great job," Solberg commented on his overall performance.
Behind him, however, there was turmoil on Sunday. The Estonian crew of Virves/Lesk finished third in their Fabia RS Rally2 after Saturday and even dared to fight Solberg. However, problems in the last full-fledged special stage saw them lose more than a minute and a drop to fifth place. Nevertheless, the crew finished third. On the final Power Stage, however, the rival crew of Nikolay Gryazin/Konstantin Alexandrov lost 20 seconds due to a puncture, while Virves and Lesk also flew through the stage 4.1 seconds faster than their rivals Georg Linnamäe/James Morgan. This brought them back to third place in the final standings, just 0.6 seconds ahead of the aforementioned Estonian-British duo.
Škoda crews also performed well in the WRC Master Cup category. Here, they took all three places on the podium. Armin Kremer and his co-driver, his daughter Elly Kremer (Baumschlager Rallye & Racing) from Germany, won, second place went to the home crew of Michal Sołowow and Maciej Baran, while third place went to the Mexican duo of Ricard Triviño and Diego Fuentes Vega (Electrolit Racing Team).
